An Audio History of the Internet from the NPR Archives

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National Public Radio is so much more than a nationwide stage for unsettlingly tranquil Minnesotans and nerdish hipsters. It’s also one of the geekiest media outlets out there—one that has embraced the new digital landscape more than any other major network.

Years before the obsessive tech blogosphere took form, NPR was already there profiling new Internet phenomena just as they started to break into the public at large. And luckily for us, nearly everything ever broadcast by NPR in the past two decades is available for free online. We took a look through NPR’s vast archives to listen in on history in the making. We uncovered some of the first broadcasts to make mention of strange nonsensical words like “Google,” “Facebook,” and “Twitter.” Think of these broadcasts as a high school yearbook for web infrastructure as seen from a few years down the road—both embarrassing and informative.

(Note: most broadcasts from the 90s are only available in RealPlayer format. To keep things simple, we’ve embedded re-broadcasts of the first two posts that were featured on Science Friday late last year. For the first two posts only, you’ll hear a modern day introduction of the clip which will be followed by the archival material about a minute in.)

What is this “Internet”? [1993]The first radio show broadcast over the Internet. One that, apparently, actually slowed down the embryonic network on the day it was broadcast.Money quote: “I consider CompuServe to be kind of part of the Internet.”

Y2K at The End of the World [December, 1999]The turn of the millennium! What a crazy time! All our techno anxieties coalesced into three little characters: Y2K. That was the computer bug that was supposed to bring down the entire global infrastructure… well, it didn’t. But what a concept! Here’s a broadcast from the last day of 1999 a day that some really thought might be their last day on Earth.Money quote: “If it’s really going to be a problem, I’d like to see the people come on the show a week from now and say, I apologize for raising alarms and the concerns and possibly giving terrorists a target to shoot at, and we were wrong.”

With Friendsters Like These, Who Needs Enemisters [July 10, 2003]Remember Friendster? It was one of the first major social networks, but one that ultimately failed because it was slow and horrible (though, it is still a relevant player in Asia, apparently). The most revealing thing about this story from the summer of 2003 is that apparently there was a “premium” version of Friendster that would allow you to contact anyone on the network. How many sign-ups could they possibly have had for that?Money quote: “It is evidently very popular and for the time being at least, it’s free.”

Google’s Cinderella Story [April 13, 2004]Here’s the first of a pair of stories about Google. These were actually the earliest I could find, even though the company had been around since 1999 and had already started to become a household name at that point. Apparently, one of the Goog’s major highlights at that point in its existence was getting a shout out on an episode of Sex in the City.Money quote: “…that prompted competitors to look for ways to out-google Google. Microsoft will launch its own search engine later this year.”

Google’s IPOh-my [July 19, 2004]The dawn of Google’s IPO. Did you buy in? Alas, I did not. The strange thing about this story is the host and guest’s description of Google as a technology whose primary purpose is to let users look up information about gazebos.Money quote: “I think [Google] is going to have some issues long term. You look at search engine marketing industry… the number keeps going down. So, Google at some point is going to suffer from the law of large numbers and they are not diversified that’s why you see them jumping into new markets like email.”

MySpace, The Final Frontier (But, not really) [February 1st, 2006]If you are of a certain age, there was a time about five years ago when everyone in your social circle was friends with a man named Tom. A mysterious man who none of your friends had ever met, but yet they counted him as a “friend.” Unfortunately for Tom, his digital venue was lugubrious and muddled with pimped-out graphics and auto-playing song files that would muck up the site and your computer. Meh! Just a mess. Also, there were sexual predators. And those are two ingredients leading to a failed social network.Money quote: “Tom, the founder of the site, is everybody’s friend.”

You really want to call your company “YouTube”? [June 6, 2006]This story profiles YouTube only six months after its debut. It was one of the fastest growing Internet phenomenons I can remember. And one that would allow any pop culture blip to automatically amplify itself into a nuclear bomb.Money quote: “Not bad for a company with 30 employees and an office over a pizza parlor”

Who is this Mark… “Zuckerberg” is it? [September 26, 2006]This story is about “Facebook.com”‘s foray into opening its virtual gates beyond college campuses and the backlash it caused among the sites early adapters. The interesting thing about this story is how… comfortable the 22-year-old Zuck comes off. The future “Person of the Year” is far more collected and coherent than many other public appearances he’s made during his tenure at the top of the company that will inevitably envelop the Earth itself.Money quote: “Facebook.com is in serious talks with Yahoo which wants to buy the site for close to one-billion dollars. And here’s the potential billion-dollar CEO, Mark Zuckerberg…” and also “If [Facebook] is open to the public, then the whole purpose of Facebook is thrown out the window”

What is this Tweetering all about? [May 21, 2007]Twitter needs little introduction. It’s that service that laid waste the English language and left in its place a smoldering corpse of voweless nonsense words and bit.ly links. And, if you remember, around 2007, it got the whole world really really excited.Money quote: “What Twitter does is it lowers the bar” also “the service isn’t making any money and they’re not sure how it will”

These are, of course, just a few examples of NPR’s Internet profiles. In another five years, it will be interesting to see how the network’s stories on Xtranormal, Tumblr, and Instagram will be remembered—hopefully more Facebook and less Friendster.

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